Tag: Technology

Some of you may have read my E3 2017 predictions a year ago, before Mid-American Culture existed. I was wrong. However, that doesn’t mean that I could do it again! The Electronic Entertainment Expo is always highly anticipated by the gaming community, It’s a cliche to say so, but it really is. Speculating is always fun, so here’s my hopes/predictions for the 2018 edition! Continue reading “E3 2018 Hopes/Predictions”

Welcome back to Mid-American Culture and thank you for checking out the newest addition to the “My First Impressions” series. This is the series where I gave my initial opinion on things in popular culture long before I have had time to create any sort of legitimate thoughts or feelings about whatever I am reviewing. Today, I will be examining the newest season of the gaming sensation Fortnite Battle Royale. As you may know, if you’ve read any of my previous content, I am a huge fan of Fortnite. The new season launched on May 1, 2018 to a great deal of hype and speculation. Epic Games did an outstanding job during Season 3 of building suspense regarding the incoming meteors and the effect they would have on the game in Season 4. In my opinion, they closed out Season 3 perfectly. That leads me into Season 4….

The first thing I wanted to check out upon purchasing my Season 4 Battle Pass was the new skins. I found them to be hit or miss. Some of the skins are absolutely incredible. The “Squad Leader” skin (pictured above) is 100% my favorite Battle Pass skin that the game has ever had. The outfit on the Squad Leader is epic and the sleeve of tattoos absolutely speaks to me. I have the utmost confidence that this skin will lead me to many wins in the future once I have unlocked it. Some of the other skins are cool as well. Considering it is the first skin unlocked, I also like the Carbide skin. It kind of looks like a dollar store version of Captain America but it’s solid and fits the season theme of superheroes well. I am obligated to point out that I am not a fan of the Omega skin. It is the final skin unlocked at Tier 100. It is a bitter disappointment. The Reaper skin (better known as the John Wick skin) became a sort of enigma to the Fortnite community. The Omega just looks like a blacked out version of the Carbide skin. Last season’s Dark Voyager was significantly more imposing and took virtually half the effort. Outside of that, I would say that Epic Games did a pretty good job with the skins. Along the same lines as the skins, the game also did a solid job with the other cosmetics. The new emotes, loading screens, gliders, and pickaxes are all fairly creative and well done.

Moving on to what is probably the most significant change to the game, the enigmatic meteor finally struck the Fortnite map. However, it did not destroy Tilted Towers as many had speculated. Instead, it struck Dusty Depot. The impact resulted in a deep crater on the map, sprinkled with consumable crystals that give your character a sort of low gravity effect. These crystals enhance jumping capabilities for short period of time and also eliminate fall damage. I loved the concept of a meteor hitting the map and destroying a location from the very beginning. I am also glad it wasn’t Tilted Towers. Despite my love/hate relationship with Tilted, I would have been very sad to see it go. Instead, they opted to destroy part of Dusty Depot and I couldn’t be happier. You could make the case that Dusty was the worst named location on the entire map. While I wouldn’t agree with that statement, it is certainly up there. They took a massively underwhelming location and made it significantly more interesting. Kudos to you once again, Epic Games. In addition to the new Dusty Divot location, several other structures were added to the game. A new location, called Risky Reels was added. This location has a drive-in movie theatre theme. Similarly, Moisty Mire was also given a movie-themed makeover. Also, several structures that I would describe as superhero bases and lairs have also popped up around the map. I think the new locations are pretty neat. I can’t say that I love them, but I also don’t have any real complaints with them either.

Overall, I think that Season 4 of Fortnite Battle Royale is very promising. Although I’m not in love with every aspect, I think the changes they made to the game will effectively keep the game new and fresh while still maintaining the basic battle royale concept that we all have grown to love. Epic Games will undoubtedly release many more updates with new additions to the game in the coming months and I look forward to all of them. I can’t wait for a Season 4 full of Victory Royales!

Thanks for reading and make sure to check out some of the other great content from the Mid-American Culture Staff!

I’ve been on a massive Kraftwerk kick lately, so, for today’s article, I thought I’d share some of their tracks that I think are great for someone who’s not too familiar with the group to get their feet wet with. So, let’s dive right in!

The current gamut of television channels seems to have reached the point where all genres and interests are now covered. Drama, comedy, animation, and reality all have bases on various channels. However, these channels had to come from somewhere, and it can be interesting to see where they came from and how they launched. Thanks to YouTube (this seems to be a trend in my articles), TV channel launches can be relived. I think they’re interesting, so I decided to talk about them. Continue reading “How Does a TV Channel Launch?”

Far Cry 5 was the most excited I’ve been for a new video game since the release of Mafia 3 in 2016. Despite my excitement, I was skeptical. Mafia 2 was one of my favorite games of all time and Mafia 3’s attempt to follow it up had fallen horrendously short and left me immensely disappointed. Far Cry 5 is in an almost identical situation: following up one of my favorite games of all time (Far Cry 4) and facing great expectations from the gaming community. The setup could not be better for Far Cry 5 to be a failure as well.

With that being said, I do not consider Far Cry 5 to be a failure at this point. It does, however, have some noteworthy problems. At the time of writing this article, I am approximately 4 hours of play time into the game. I have encountered several bugs that forced me to either manually restart missions or led me to an inevitable death that forced me to restart at a prior checkpoint. I can’t even begin to explain how frustrating this is, especially considering my next gripe with the game. The combat is very very challenging. While I must point out that I am used to Fortnite combat, which is a far cry different than that of Far Cry 5 (pun intended). But regardless, I found myself dying far more than I ever should as early as I was into the game. Perhaps the combat will get easier as I become more familiar. I simply wouldn’t be honest in giving my initial thoughts of the game if I didn’t mention that. My only other significant complaint about the game thus far is that the open-world concept that the game employs may be a little too open world, if that makes any sort of sense. The missions are entirely spread out throughout the immense map as of this point, the game doesn’t feel linear in the slightest. I feel as if I could do these quests in any order and the game would make just as much sense as it does now. It is worth mentioning again that I am only around 4 hours into a campaign that is said to be able to last up to 25 hours, so the story may line up more as time progresses.

Now that my issues with the game are out of the way, I can talk about the good. First off, I absolutely love the game’s concept. The idea of fighting a right-wing religious cult in the heartland of America speaks to me on a subconscious level. This fresh concept paired with the current real-world political climate make the game that much more enthralling. In addition to this, I find the game’s main protagonists, the 4 members of the Seed family, to be utterly brilliant. Each has their own twisted, semi-psychotic characteristics. This makes them extremely easy to hate, a quality which they share with Far Cry 4’s protagonist Pagan Min. The story, elevated by these great protagonists, has potential to be fantastic if executed properly. I look forward to seeing if the campaign meets its full potential. Before I wrap up my favorite parts of the game, I feel like I have to mention the Pee Tape mission. Early on in my play-through, I encountered a certain familiar CIA agent from past games in the series who had been tasked with recovering a videotape that was said to be greatly embarrassing to the in-game President of the United States. The subtle innuendos and references to the so called “Pee Tape” which is rumored to contain video proof of Russian prostitutes urinating on President Donald Trump are absolutely hilarious. I was so glad the game included a real-world reference like this, especially given its parallel to our current political climate. I really enjoyed it.

Overall, I feel that the game has a lot of potential. With bug fixes certain to be coming in the form of updates and further plot development, it could really be something special. It may even have what it takes to beat out its predecessor. Once I finish the game, I will post a full review and give my final thoughts on it. This may come as early as next Wednesday, or as late as the following Wednesday. Regardless, you can rest assured that it is coming. In the meantime, check out some of the other great content put out by the Mid-American Culture crew. Thanks for reading, and I’ll see you next Wednesday.

YouTube is an awesome platform. It gives anyone with a creative drive and a camera the opportunity to both express themselves and to entertain others who share an interest in their content. Today, I am going to tell you about my three favorite YouTube channels. One of them is a gaming channel, one is a music channel, and one is a sneaker/fashion channel. If anyone is interested in checking them out, links to their respective channels will be provided. Enjoy!

Swiftor

Swiftor is hands down my favorite gaming channel on YouTube. I think what I really like about his channel is that it is not your typical gaming channel. My favorite content of his would probably have to be the mini-games he plays with other gamers, typically in Call of Duty or Grand Theft Auto. Anyone who enjoys gaming content should watch his recordings of a game called Mafia, played within Call of Duty. However, if games such as Call of Duty just aren’t your thing, Swiftor has also posted gameplay from games such as The Price is Right, PUBG, Friday the 13th, and H1Z1 Auto Royale all in the last week. As far as gaming goes, I feel like Swift has content for just about everybody. He is an absurdly entertaining dude and I highly recommend anyone who enjoys gaming videos check out his channel!

Meami is a music reaction channel that I just recent discovered. I’m so glad that I did. Reaction videos are some of my favorite videos on all of YouTube and as far as music reactions go, Meami is the best. Watching him react to new music releases is just entertaining. There’s something about the dude’s energy that just makes him a blast to watch. I completely agree with his musical opinions more than not, which is always nice when watching reaction content. Meami is just a cool guy who likes music, games, and his awesome tattoos are also worth noting. Anyone who enjoys hip-hop/rap and/or reaction videos should definitely check him out.

YoAnty was the very first channel I ever subscribed to on YouTube. To this day, he is still my absolute favorite YouTuber. There isn’t a more genuine guy on YouTube. Although he doesn’t do them anymore, his vlogs were the most entertaining on the internet, in my opinion. His sneaker/clothing hauls and reviews are great. The production quality of all of his videos is top-notch, and his thoughts on whatever he’s talking about are always extremely informative. Above all else, he is just a fun, entertaining guy on YouTube who likes talking about shoes, cats, and iced coffee (jet fuel only). He hasn’t fallen victim to the clickbait nonsense that seems to have taken over sneaker YouTube in recent years. He has stayed true to what earned him his subscriber base and I think that’s extremely commendable. Anyone who likes sneakers should absolutely check out his channel!

There are certain sensations that we eventually became inundated by, and, after sufficient exposure, try to suppress to the deep recesses of our minds in order to maintain sanity. There are a few cases of this for me. For example, I often hear the sounds of MTV U playing in my college cafeteria, which I escape via earbuds. Or the sounds of ongoing construction, often resolved by the same solution as the prior example. But, a particularly notable example of this phenomenon came rushing back into my mind relatively recently, and I thought I’d share it with you all today.